The More They Stay the Same: White Educational Preservation in Post-integration Mississippi

Federal intervention led to public school integration in Mississippi between 1966 and 1971 and the establishment of a host of White flight academies. Yet since 1972 there have been other methods used by people across the state to create and maintain White majority public schools or prevent integrative efforts. This chapter discusses three unique and innovative methods utilized to maintain a semblance of White control in public education in the state followed by a discussion of evidence of change in the educational environment in the 60 years since public school integration. This study uses archival qualitative studies and Census data to highlight the three methods: generational White-flight, address migration, and district secession. These examples reveal that there are still elements present in Mississippi, and moreover American society, that lend themselves to upholding White supremacy and White control over institutions like public education. These findings posit that integration in public education from 1955 through the early 1970s may not have been as thorough or complete as assumed and that the resulting resegregation has actually shaped the educational system of Mississippi to appear more similar to states outside the American South.